An Apache Princess

No question now as to the duty immediately before them. In twenty

minutes the pack mules were again strapped between the saplings, the

little command was slowly climbing toward the westward heights, with

Arnold and two of his friends scouting the rough trail and hillsides,

firing at long intervals and listening in suspense almost intolerable

for some answering signal. The other of their number had volunteered

to follow Stout over the plateau toward the Pass and acquaint him with

the latest news.

While the sun was still high in the heavens, far to the northward,

they faintly heard or thought they heard two rifle shots. At four

o'clock, as they toiled through a tangle of rock and stunted pine,

Arnold, riding well to the front, came suddenly out upon a bare ledge

from which he could look over a wild, wide sweep of mountain side,

stretching leagues to north and south, and there his keen and

practiced eye was greeted by a sight that thrilled him with dread

unspeakable. Dread, not for himself or his convoy of wounded, but

dread for Angela. Jutting, from the dark fringe of pines along a

projecting bluff, perhaps four miles away, little puffs or clouds of

smoke, each separate and distinct, were sailing straight aloft in the

pulseless air--Indian signals beyond possibility of doubt. Some

Apaches, then, were still hovering about the range overlooking the

broad valley of the Sandy, some of the bands then were prowling in the

mountains between the scouting troops and the garrisoned post. Some

must have been watching this very trail, in hopes of intercepting

couriers or stragglers, some must have seen and seized poor Angela.

He had sprung from saddle and leveled his old field glass at the

distant promontory, so absorbed in his search he did not note the

coming of the little column. The litter bearing Blakely foremost of

the four had halted close beside him, and Blakely's voice, weak and

strained, yet commanding, suddenly startled him with demand to be told

what he saw, and Arnold merely handed him the glass and pointed. The

last of the faint smoke puffs was just soaring into space, making

four still in sight. Blakely never even took the binocular. He had

seen enough by the unaided eye.

With uplifted hand the sergeant had checked the coming of the next

litter, Wren's, and those that followed it. One of the wounded men,

the poor lad crazed by the perils of the siege, was alert and begging

for more water, but Wren was happily lost to the world in swoon or

slumber. To the soldier bending over him he seemed scarcely breathing.

Presently they were joined by two of Arnold's party who had been

searching out on the left flank. They, too, had seen, and the three

were now in low-toned conference. Blakely for the moment was unnoted,

forgotten.